The 2017 CIBJO Congress will take place in Bangkok, Thailand, November 5-7, 2017, with pre-congress meetings beginning on November 2. The World Ruby Forum, which is being organised in conjunction with the congress, will take place November 4. The main venue for the CIBJO Congress and the official congress hotel will be the Shangri-La Bangkok.

CIBJO, the World Jewellery Confederation, will hold its 2017 annual congress in Bangkok, Thailand, November 5-7, 2016, with pre-congress meetings beginning on November 2. The World Ruby Forum, which is being organised in conjunction with the congress, will take place November 4.

The six CIBJO Blue Books are definitive sets of grading standards and nomenclature for diamonds, coloured gemstones, pearls, coral, precious metals, and gemmological laboratories.

The requirement that all jewellery components be shown to have been responsibly and ethically sourced, handled and traded has become a central tenet of the luxury markets in the 21st Century, and it has led to the development of a service sector that provides the means and methods of ensuring the integrity of the supply chain.

The Precious Metals Commission featured a discussion on changes to regulations regarding use of nickel, particularly the EN1811:2011 standard which had caused concerns to the trade.

Sector A President Roland Naftule opened the meeting by thanking CIBJO President Gaetano Cavalieri and all the Commission Presidents for their hard work in the period that has passed since the 2015 CIBJO Congress in Salvador, Brazil, in May 2015.

Meeting on the second day of the 2016 CIBJO Congress, the organisation’s Pearl Commission reviewed recommended edits to the Pearl Book proposed by the body’s steering committee, including recommendations for the definitions for Blister and Blister Pearl.

The Coral Commission meeting, chaired by Vice President Pornsawat Wathanakul, as the president, Vincenzo Liverino, was unable to attend, reviewed the further development of the Coral Blue Book.

CIBJO’s Ethics Commission President Cecilia Gardner began the session by reviewing the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) course, developed by CIBJO together with Branded Trust of Australia. The course is now available online, and is accessible through the CIBJO website.

The need to improve a firm’s carbon footprint and environmental impact was the heart of the message given at the Marketing & Education Commission by environmental consultant Moya McKeown of Carbon-Expert.